All the rage lately are something called adult coloring books! Detailed, intricate drawings that call for a steady hand and a need for colorful artwork; these coloring books are claimed to be a new form of therapy for stressed adults.

Studies show that coloring or doodling is a way for people to focus and organize their thoughts. It’s an easy task that allows the brain to slow down and process. Coloring also provides an escape of sorts; allowing people to be creative within a certain set of parameters. The linework (pun intended) is already laid down for you; all you have to do is go crazy with color!

Repetitive, hands-on actions are shown to release serotonin, which is responsible for relaxation. As you can see from the below coloring book excerpts, each image is highly detailed with lots of intricate, repetitive patterns. We suggest using colored pencils for these designs…

Last night, I had a knitting crisis. We finished with dinner early, leaving me with a good hour-plus to work on Mom’s sweater.

I haven’t touched her sweater in over a week. My knitting has been mostly relegated to stockinette and garter stitch projects only, because much of my so-called spare time is now taken up by Nordic walking, strength training at the gym, and working with Eric on his chemistry homework. So, having an hour or so on a day when I wasn’t totally wiped out and had retained sufficient mental energy to follow a chart meant that I could make at least a little progress on the top-down cabled cardigan for Mom. I settled into my knitting chair, pulled out the chart and sweater, plugged in my iPhone, and pulled up the row counter app.

Blame it on a childhood spent as the oddball and the outsider–I often find myself irresistibly drawn to knitting techniques that can’t get a seat with the cool kids.

Shadow knitting (sometimes called illusion knitting) is one such. I remember with perfect clarity the first time I saw it. I was a fledgling, making my maiden visit to a fiber festival. As I toddled through the vendor market with a clutch of far more experienced knitters, I came to a dead stop in front of a striped sweater with a geometric pattern that appeared out of nowhere, then disappeared. Then appeared. Then disappeared. Then–

Ten years ago, had you asked any of my coworkers to describe me they’d all have said the same thing: “He’s the weirdo who knits in meetings.” It’s true. I am a weirdo, and I did knit furiously through every meeting that didn’t require me to check my needles at the door.

I am sorry to say it was not a very nice place to work. Some days, the soothing influence of knitting was all that kept me on the side of perfect propriety. It is not easy to slap someone when both your hands are otherwise engaged.

Stuff I was knitting began to draw notice in the burgeoning online fiber arts community. I was asked to write articles. I was asked to write a book. I was asked to teach knitting classes. I was asked to design patterns. I sad yes. Also yes, yes, yes, and…

Okay. For the record: I like facebook. It’s a great place to hang with friends, far and near. It’s a nice, quiet place to have an awesome chat. It’s also a place that I can get sucked in with all of the nifty, neato things you can do with cast off items. One of these items is a bowling ball. I found this post tonight and decided that I most definitely need to find at least one old bowling ball, so I can make one of these cute lawn creatures, as shared by https://www.facebook.com/usbc.

When it’s time to retire your bowling balls, there are so many cool things you can do with them! Check it out!!

This post is for all of you DIYers that are interested in building a nice, portable, standing weaving loom. This is the same loom I use for darn near everything I weave. It costs less than $50 to make. The pdf file is free to download. You can sell all of the looms you want. DO NOT sell my pattern.

The following pictures are merely for reference while you’re building your loom. Please, if you have any questions, contact me and I’ll do the best I can to help. (And yes, the little folding loom on the floor, to the left of the standing loom, is a tapestry loom that I also made. When time permits, I will do up the instructions for this one as well.)

The above photo of the loom has a rug on the front side of it and I turned it around to start a card weaving (it’s the dog leash I currently walk Princess Vanity with)!!